Indoor Tanning: No Dose Is A Safe Dose

Those of you who use tanning beds should take heed: there’s new proof that there is no such thing as a safe tanning bed or a safe dose. Last year I warned readers about the new, stronger U.S. government classification of tanning beds as “carcinogenic to humans”; now there’s an even stronger study which shows a strong correlation with tanning beds and the deadly melanoma skin cancer. Here are the details, via futurity.com (Is indoor tanning ever safe?):

The study involving 2,268 Minnesotans found that people who use any type of tanning bed for any amount of time are 74 percent more likely to develop melanoma.

Frequent users are 2.5 to 3 times more likely to develop melanoma than those who never use tanning devices. (The study defines frequent uses as people who used indoor tanning for 50 plus hours, more than 100 sessions, or for 10-plus years. This increased risk applies similarly to all ages and genders.)

Details are reported in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention.

“We found that it didn’t matter the type of tanning device used; there was no safe tanning device,” says DeAnn Lazovich, lead researcher and associate professor of epidemiology at the University of Minnesota. “We also found—and this is new data—that the risk of getting melanoma is associated more with how much a person tans and not the age at which a person starts using tanning devices. Risk rises with frequency of use, regardless of age, gender, or device.”